Flex Your Brain Muscles with a Jigsaw Puzzle

There’s always conversation about our physical health and its benefits, but what about our brain health? Considering that the human brain is the most vital of organs, keeping it healthy should be a top priority. In addition to being physically active and eating healthy, it is important to exercise your brain with creative and challenging activities. Participating in mind-stimulating activities in one’s early to middle years can greatly reduce one’s risk at developing brain-related diseases at an older age. Studies have shown that people who keep their brains active on a regular basis are much less likely to develop brain plaques that are associated with Alzheimer’s disease.

Jigsaw puzzles have been around for centuries. Many of us played with puzzles as children, which provided important physical, cognitive, and emotional skills. Putting together jigsaw puzzles is not only a fun activity but is also greatly beneficial to our psychological development and a great workout for the brain. Puzzles stimulate both sides of the brain. The logical left brain is sequential, rational, analytical, and objective and is stimulated by problem-solving while the creative right brain is instinctive and subjective. When putting together a jigsaw puzzle, your abilities to learn, understand, and remember are reinforced. Even the completion of a puzzle has its benefits, encouraging the production of dopamine, which regulates mood, affects our concentration and motivation, and aids in memory and motor control.

There have been several studies on the benefits of puzzles and brain health, most notably the MacArthur Study, which has found that those that play with jigsaw puzzles have a better quality of life and longer life expectancy. Studies have also found that they reduce the chances of developing mental illnesses such as memory loss, dementia, and Alzheimer’s disease. Alzheimer’s affects an estimated 5.4 million Americans and is the sixth-leading cause of death among all adults and the fifth leading cause for those aged 65 or older. Those affected by the disease is on the rise and is expected to affect over 13 million American’s by 2050.

For patients with Alzheimer’s and dementia, puzzles put the brain cells to work, keeping more parts of the brain active for longer and slowing the rate of memory loss. There are jigsaw puzzles made especially for patients with Alzheimer’s and dementia, with smaller piece counts and larger pieces and nostalgic themes to help trigger memory. In summary, the biggest advantages of jigsaw puzzles for patients of Alzheimer’s and dementia are:

The deceleration of cognitive decline – The mental stimulation a jigsaw puzzle activates the brain and slows the memory loss process.

An increase of dopamine – Working and completing a puzzle produces dopamine, which in turn improves motor skills and increases concentration, optimism, confidence, and recollection.

Meditation – Puzzles naturally induce a state of creative and focused meditation. A better mindset and sense of tranquility is achieved, which can lead to improvement in self-confidence.

While working on a jigsaw puzzle may seem to be one of the simplest of activities, it is a great workout for your brain with several lifelong benefits. It is a unique activity that anyone can enjoy and there’s nothing like the sense of accomplishment once a puzzle is complete.

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Cure Alzheimer’s Fund

Cure Alzheimer's Fund is a non-profit organization dedicated to funding research with the highest probability of preventing, slowing or reversing Alzheimer's disease.

For many years, Alzheimer’s disease research was completely stifled by a lack of funding. Pharmaceutical companies were too wary of past failures to fund any new drug development. The drug pipeline was coming up dry, and researchers weren’t encouraged to think big or bold.

Cure Alzheimer’s Fund has helped change that. They are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization founded in 2004 by three families frustrated by the slow pace of research. Leveraging their experience in venture capital and corporate start-ups, the founders (Henry McCance, Phyllis Rappaport and Jacqui and Jeff Morby) came together to build a new Alzheimer’s research fund designed to dramatically accelerate research, make bold bets and focus exclusively on finding a cure.

Since its founding, Cure Alzheimer’s Fund has contributed more than $50,000,000 to research, and its funded initiatives have been responsible for several key breakthroughs—including a potential treatment recently selected by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) for its elite “Blueprint” drug discovery program, and the ground-breaking “Alzheimer's in a Dish” study, which promises to greatly accelerate drug testing and was reported by The New York Times as a “giant step forward”.

Cure Alzheimer’s Fund supports some of the best scientific minds in the field of Alzheimer’s research, and it does so without any financial gain for its founders or donors. Fully 100 percent of funds raised by Cure Alzheimer’s Fund go directly to research—the Board of Directors covers all overhead expenses. .Their Research Consortium is an all-star team of scientists working at premier research institutions across the country, regularly conferring with one another on the progress and impediments in their research and constantly sharing their data.

Their goal is to stop Alzheimer’s disease through early prediction, prevention and effective intervention in those patients who have become symptomatic.

Puzzles to Remember

PUZZLES TO REMEMBER is a 501(c)3 organization that provides puzzles to nursing homes, veteran’s facilities, and other facilities that care for Alzheimer's and dementia patients. Puzzles To Remember was founded in 2008 by Max Wallack, who recognized the calming effect of puzzles and many other benefits on people suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. Max graduated from Boston University, Summa Cum Laude, in 2015, and is now a medical school student.

Since 2011, Puzzles To Remember’s Assistant Director, Hailey Richman, age 8, has been distributing puzzles to nursing facilities in the New York area. Hailey spends time doing the puzzles with nursing home residents. She always brightens their days.

Max Wallack graduated from Boston University and worked as a Research Intern in the Molecular Psychiatry and Aging Laboratory in the Department of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics at Boston University School of Medicine. He is currently a student at Harvard Medical School. His great grandmother, Gertrude, suffered from Alzheimer's disease. Max is the founder of PUZZLES TO REMEMBER. PTR is a project that provides puzzles to nursing homes and veterans institutions that care for Alzheimer's and dementia patients.